


Neville Longbottom and The Year In Which Everyone Was Left Relatively Unmolested

by SkuldTheNorn



Series: The Other One [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Absconding Toads, Gen, Somewhat Of A Retelling, The Weasley Twins Rock, first year, oneshots, poor Neville
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-02-18 15:30:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13103154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkuldTheNorn/pseuds/SkuldTheNorn
Summary: Life hasn't always been easy for Neville Longbottom, but at least it's been simple.But when it suddenly transpires that he does indeed have magic, everything gets much more complicated. These are a few of his (mis)adventures in his first year at Hogwarts.





	1. Neville Longbottom and The Joy Of Bouncing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Enecola](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enecola/gifts).



Neville’s world was upside down. Not that that was all that unusual metaphorically – if you believed his grandmother, Nevilles’s life had gone topsy-turvy in all kinds of ways right from the beginning. This one time, however, his problem was rather more literal.

Great-Uncle Algie had him dangling out of a second floor window by his ankles. Which was, of course, petrifying. The ground was feet upon feet away from him – the Longbottom estate was, after all, a stately one – but nonetheless looked very solid. Skull-smashingly so. On top of that, it was cold. The wind was gripping at him, grasping for purchase to carry him away. It had already stolen an almost full packet of Bertie Bott’s Beans from him, Neville lamented silently. Those were always so difficult to sneak past Grandma, and therefore a rare treat.

This wasn’t the first incident of its kind, Great-Uncle Algie had already employed several tactics he had hoped would get Neville’s magic to show – and Grandmother had pretended not to notice, which resulted in her later being disparaging without ever saying why. None of those tricks had ever worked. It appeared, for all intents and purposes, that Neville was about as magical as mince pie.

Neville himself seemed to be the only one who didn’t find this enormously problematic. He’d never felt a strong wish to transfigure his shoes into newts or brew a potion that would make you sprout yellow scales in the most inconvenient places on your body. He was just fine, thank you very much. Since Grandmother had given him free reign over the expansive herb garden on the estate, he was as content as he’d ever been. Something about the plants calmed him. They were so simple. None of them would ever dream of holding expectations, they simply were. They also had very simple and straight-forward uses – at least most of them. Most of them could cure you, some of them could kill you. It was usually either one or the other. Grandmother, Neville thought, could do both, and he rarely knew which she was in the mood for.

It wasn’t that his grandmother was evil, or even malicious in her intent. She was just brash and not very considerate of other’s people’s feelings. She also wasn’t very fond of children, he had a feeling. Or maybe she just didn’t like Neville. He was, after all, not her talented son. No, her talented son had gotten sick (“in his prime”, Grandma used to say when she told him the story) and left her with a grandson who was now most likely going to end up exploding on the ground like a ripe melon.

“Please, Uncle Algie, can’t you let me go?” he begged, and not for the first time. You had to be careful how you talked to Great-Uncle Algie. He did, for example, not like to be called _Great-Uncle_ , it made him feel too old.

“Oh, don’t be like that, Neville. You know it’s for your own good.”

Neville sighed. It always went like that.

“Please?” It couldn’t hurt to try, after all.

“No. Threatening situations such as this one are sometimes needed to bring forth a child’s magic, don’t you know? Sadly, you can’t just tickle it out of every little boy and girl. This is only for your best!” His upside-down face looked severely disapproving. Neville knew this because Great-Uncle Algie’s face always looked various levels of disapproving. Only once, when Neville had perfectly recited all plants beginning with the letter E that could kill you, he had smiled. That had been quite disturbing, and Neville hoped very much to never see it again. Great-uncles weren’t supposed to smile. It made them look _nice._ Great-Uncles weren’t supposed to look nice.

Another gust of wind swept a few droplets of water into his face. _Great._ Now it was starting to rain. The house elves were going to have to bring in the laundry – would one of them maybe deign to bring him? Ferdi might even consider it, she was always rather concerned about his health.

“Master Neville should not weeds the garden all day in the sun. He will gets burned again!” she had scolded him just last week when he had told her about his plans to reorganise the herb garden. He had still done it, of course. He had also _– of course –_ gotten a rather nasty sunburn. Ferdi had only tended to him with much tutting.

Neville was rather lost in thought by the time he heard Great-Auntie Enid’s voice waft out of the window above him.

“Would you like a meringue?” she asked Great-Uncle Algie.

“Of course!” Great-Uncle Algie replied.

And then, Neville was falling. There wasn’t anything to be done about it, there was no purchase to be found on the wall, and he quite tragically lacked the ability to grow wings.

So Neville closed his eyes and tried not to pee his pants and cursed the fact that the portrait that was done of him when he was three and still thought randomly taking his pants off was funny might be all that would be left of him in the world. Someone who might want to look at a picture of him would almost certainly be confronted with his bare bum, which was just wonderful.

But the dreaded impact never came. Or rather, it did, but it oddly felt a lot like bouncing on his bed. Neville Longbottom bounced off of the front lawn – which he knew was hard because he had fallen flat on his face on it not a month ago – and bounced, and bounced again, all the way to the road where he rather unceremoniously landed on his butt. Which was the first thing that hurt like it should have. And bleeding hell _did_ it hurt.

He looked about himself with something akin to panic. There was lead in his stomach and a realisation dawning at the back of his mind. It couldn’t be, could it? He… No. Someone had cast a spell on him at the last second and saved him. His grandmother. Grandmother had a sixth sense for knowing when he was really in trouble and then getting him out of it. Something about _protecting the Longbottom heir_. Neville never had the gut to point out that his cousin Trevor was both older and more magical than him. (He knew this because Trevor never ceased to remind him of it.) Hope was sure to be disappointed. He shouldn’t hope.

But when he looked up, there were two rather stricken faces looking out of the second floor window. Great-Uncle Algie’s eyes were open so wide he couldn’t even frown anymore. And then, when his grandmother stepped up to the window and looked as shocked as the others did, he knew. He knew. This was real. 

Neville laughed. He’d _bounced._ He’d bounced, and landed on his bum and hurt himself, as he usually did. But he’d _bounced._ Which meant he had _magic._ He was one of them now, part of his family. They’d stop tormenting him now. They’d be nice to him now, because he belonged.

 

 

Nothing changed, of course. Or, rather, not much. Grandma still told him not to dry sage in his room, and to dress like a gentleman. Great-Uncle Algie still ruffled his hair and pushed him around and pinched him. But at least now his hair got all poofy when he did that, for whatever reason. _Whatever reason,_ Neville thought. _Whatever reason is my magic._ Now all he needed to be able to do is get control of it so that his magic maybe gave Great-Uncle Algie shocks or something like that. That would be great.

 

 

His Hogwarts letter came in the mail some time in May, and Neville could’ve sworn he saw his grandmother smile. Great-Uncle Algie jumped in the air, laughed, and hugged Neville. Behaviour most unseemly of a man of his standing, to be certain.

Neville was scared. This was likely just another place he wouldn’t fit in. He didn’t even fit in with his own family, and they were related to him. Not to mention that he’d never really met anyone else. Not often, anyways.

Tentatively, he tried to ask Grandmother if he maybe could not go to Hogwarts. He’d never seen her so appalled as he did that day.

“Nonsense!” she had said, and that was that. He was going to go to Hogwarts.

 

 

His cousin, of course, would taunt him.

“They’re not going to like you there. You’re too much of a freak”, he said.

“You’re not going to do well there. You’re almost a squib, you won’t be able to do anything. You’ll see, they’ll fail you after just one year”, he said.

“You’re not even going to find friends in Hufflepuff, and those are all loosers anyways”, he said.

 

 

Neville took revenge by naming the stupid toad Great-Uncle Algie gave him Trevor. But deep down, he was afraid. This was going to be the hardest thing he’d ever do.


	2. Neville Longbottom and Trevor, That Blasted Toad

Trevor was gone again. Trevor had already been gone fifteen times since he’d gotten him, and it had only been a week. That toad seemed to have a knack of discovering the smallest of places to squeeze himself into and then attempting to hibernate, maybe. It had to be something similar to that, because he wouldn’t make one bloody noise, which made it really difficult to find him.

The first time, he hadn’t even noticed Trevor had been gone until Ferdi entered his room.

“Master Neville’s pet is being in Ferdi’s treasure chest, Sir”, the house elf had said, her thin voice quivering with indignation. “Master Neville’s pet is not belonging in Ferdi’s treasure chest, Sir.”

And so Master Neville had apologised profusely and followed Ferdi to the elf quarters. He’d never been allowed there, a decree spoken by his grandmother as much as the elves themselves. They were a deeply private folk. Which was why, Neville suspected, Ferdi was so upset even over a toad. It seemed that, just hours after arriving, Trevor had managed to commit a grave faux-pas. He didn’t seem to be aware of it, though, looking up at him with dumb, glossy amphibian eyes.

Afterwards, the toad had found his way, among other places, into a tea cup, into the rubbish bin, into a medical cabinet, into the drawer his Grandmother kept her knickers in, into Neville’s shoe, under an upturned flower pot, into a gigantic ancient vase and into Great-Uncle Algie’s trunk on the day he would start his journey home. The latter had not so much been Trevor’s fault as it had been Neville’s – not that anyone would never know. It couldn’t hurt to try, after all.

And now, that blasted toad was gone again. On the Hogwarts train, of all the places on Merlin’s green Earth. Suddenly, Neville was being haunted by images of his pet being squashed by feet or huge trunks, pecked by travel-starved owls.

How he’d gotten so attached so soon he really didn’t know. But he had to find that overgrown frog; there was no way beyond that. So he steeled himself and did exactly that. He knocked at the door of each compartment, awkwardly cleared his throat and asked them if they had seen his toad. He’d even written the question down to make sure he got it exactly right.

“Excuse me, please. I’ve lost my toad. His name is Trevor. Have you seen him?”

Most just shook their heads and said they hadn’t without even looking under their seats. Those situations were the most uncomfortable, because that meant he would have to kneel down and look for Trevor himself – which really wasn’t something he wanted to do in a compartment full of giggling fifth-year Ravenclaw girls. They must have thought he was so stupid. Who even lost their toad?

He’d already gone through two wagons _(damn you, Trevor, could you even have gotten into another one without killing yourself?) (oh, wait, yes you could - you also managed to get up into the chandelier in the dining room)_ when he opened to the door to another compartment and immediately knew he was in trouble.

“Excuse me, please. I’ve lost my toad. His name is Trevor. Have you seen him?” he rattled off his question.

Brown eyes widened. “You have a toad? That’s so neat! Trevor is a great name. What species is he? I’ve heard the _bombina bombina_ is very popular with British wizards and witches. Is he one of those? Do you need my help searching for him?”

Neville just nodded silently. He didn’t know what to do with so many questions he didn’t have the answers to, but he knew he could use some help. If she was that good at talking, maybe she would also be that good at finding toads.

 

Her name was Hermione Granger, Neville discovered, and she was no better at finding toads than he was. They were going over the whole train for the second time, now, and his hopes were dwindling.

Hermione had her own question that she repeated every time.

“Has anyone seen a toad? Neville’s lost one.”

At this point, Neville was very thankful that Trevor – cousin-Trevor, mind you, not toad-Trevor – was not going to Hogwarts by train but would instead spend the day in Hogsmeade with his parents before being brought up to the castle. Spoiled rotten he would be, but at east he didn’t see him humiliated before they even arrived. _Neville, toad-boy, he was almost crying,_ he could already hear them say. He would indeed be lucky if he found someone who would be willing to be friends with him. Or even just to not tease him.

 

Harry Potter was on this train, Neville discovered. _The boy who lived._ Neville was astounded at how ordinary Harry looked. Just seeing him, he would have never thought that the other boy might be something special.

As he watched Hermione interact with the two boys, Neville already felt less alone. Harry didn’t seem to really have much of an idea of anything, he looked pretty overwhelmed. Ron Weasley – the red-haired boy – clearly had thought that something that could never have been an actual spell was a spell. And Hermione, with as much as she knew, didn’t seem to be liked by them very much.

Maybe, he thought, he wouldn’t stick out all that horribly. Maybe all of them would be this awkward. There would be boys and girls from Muggle families who wouldn’t know anything about magic. There would be a few among them who, even though they were raised in wizarding families, had never formally been taught magic. None of them would need to know that he had been taught extensively. They would just think that he was just as inexperienced – and therefore bad – as them. It wouldn’t have to be too bad.

If only he could keep one Trevor close and the other far away.

 

 

The boats were scary. Neville had never liked boats.

“Oy, you there! Is this your toad?” Hagrid asked him.

Neville supposed boats weren’t all that bad. He looked down at Trevor, who was cool in his hands, innocently looking up at him. Though, Neville supposed, Trevor may as well be plotting his murder for all he knew. He was a toad, and that was all he looked like. But whatever species of toad he was, Neville thought, he wasn’t particularly toadish.

The only real question to ask here was _why_.

 

 

 

The sorting ceremony, Neville felt, was designed for public humiliation. Who had ever had the idea that that might be a good idea – have children put on an old hat that shouted out what house they would be in? He would like it much better if such things were conducted in private – so that one could cry in private. He really had no wish to be confronted with exactly how little he fit in in front of the whole school.

“Granger, Hermione” was sorted into “GRYFFINDOR!” This was surprising to Neville. He had been so sure that she would be sorted into Ravenclaw. It had just seemed to fit… Grandma always said all the really smart ones would end up in Ravenclaw. And that he never would.

The Hufflepuff house table started to look inviting to him. They were all chatting amongst each other, laughing together, checking each other into their sides with their elbows when someone they knew got sorted. They cheered for new house members just as jubilantly as Gryffindor did. He could be comfortable there, Neville thought. Maybe he might even find some friends. Everyone looked so nice. Maybe it would be easy.

“Leeland, Porter” was sorted into “RAVENCLAW!” and suddenly, his heart was in his stomach. Or his shoes, maybe. Way out of place, anyways. There couldn’t be many more people before him. They weren’t all that many, after all.

“Longbottom, Neville”, the Sorting Hat called out, and it was like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over him. Slowly, he moved towards the front. Whispers broke out in the room, and he heard a few people giggle. _Toad boy,_ he thought to himself. _Yup. They know me already._

And then, suddenly, he wasn’t thinking a whole lot anymore, because the Sorting Hat had been lowered on his head.

“So… What do you think?” he heard the hat’s voice in his thoughts.

“What do you mean, what do _I_ think? Aren’t you supposed to decide this?”

“Maybe, maybe not. So: What do you think?”

“Hufflepuff?”

“Is that a question? You don’t sound very confident.”

This was weird. This was very weird. “Well, of course I don’t. It’s not like I’m going to fit in anywhere. But I think Hufflepuff would be best. It would be the most comfortable.”

“Do you want comfortable? You shouldn’t settle – remember, this is for seven years. You should be sure. Is there anything you actually want? Because I could swear there was…”

Neville’s ears were burning now. He’d never even dared to think it. It felt too forward. This wasn’t something he should wish for. It wouldn’t ever happen. He’d just as soon get into Slytherin.

“You wouldn’t survive in Slytherin. You’re much too good-natured”, the hat said.

Neville slumped a bit.

“Go on, say it. You know you want to.”

“But why?” Neville asked.

“Because you can.”

And so Neville took a deep, fortifying breath. “Gryffindor”, he thought.

“GRYFFINDOR!” the hat cried out.

Neville couldn’t believe it. He didn’t really knew anything else anymore – except that he didn’t want to give the hat a chance to rethink it. Which was why he stood up and ran towards the table – only to be called back, because he was still wearing the hat. At least he was sure that he was the only one who could hear the hat itself laugh.

“MacDougal, Morag” was being sorted into Merlin-knew-where, but Neville didn’t care anymore. He was sitting at the Gryffindor house table, tummy warm and feet itchy with a need to move. This was awesome. As soon as he’d divested himself of the hat, room had been made for him at the table. Hands had reached out to him, patted him on the back. Smiling faces had welcomed him. He felt included. It was exhilarating.

It was even more exhilarating when “Potter, Harry” was also sorted into Gryffindor and Neville broke out in cheer right alongside his housemates. Harry Potter was in _his_ house.

And he did indeed think of Gryffindor as _his_ house already. That was how swept-up he was in the community spirit. This was the first time that he’d ever truly felt part of something, and he revelled in it.

 

 

 

He only noticed that he’d lost Trevor again later that night when a girl nearly screamed her head off upon finding him sitting in the mashed potatoes.

 

 


	3. Neville Longbottom and the Inconvenience of Being Petrified in the Common Room

“Neville”, Hermione had said, “I’m really, really sorry about this.”

And then, he’d been hit with the full body binding curse. It was terrifying, feeling his body right itself, snap to attention without any of his input. He had probably never stood that straight in his life. He’d also never fallen flat on his face without even stretching his arms out to catch himself. Granted, that usually resulted in broken wrists – like it had after that debacle of a flying lesson – but still. It was easier on his nose.

What had he ever done to deserve this? He was doing exactly what Harry had told him to do. He’d stood up for himself. For his house, for Gryffindor. They were only going to get in trouble again, they always were. They had already lost major house points – he simply didn’t want to allow them to do it again.

They’d gathered around him to apologise, to tell him how he’d understand later.  _ Understand later? _ What did they think he was, a five year-old? This was not something people did. They did not just petrify someone to not get into trouble. And they most certainly didn’t  _ let them lie there, face down, in the middle of the bloody room! _

This was just another thing they were going to get in trouble for. Because Neville would tell. There was no justification for this. And Harry Potter, warped as his priorities appeared to be, was right. Neville had to stand up for himself. This was no way to be treated.

It always seemed to be them, too. They treated him like he was something that was stuck to their shoe, an annoyance. Like he was in their way. He had not expected that of them, and especially not Harry and Ron. Hermione he could understand a little bit, she was vastly more intelligent than him. But she was also vastly more intelligent than the other two boys, and yet she still spent an awful lot of time with them – even after Ron had been so mean to her in the beginning.

The other Gryffindors, surprisingly, were a lot nicer to him. Seamus Finnigan laboriously tried to explain the rules of football to him – not with an awful lot of success, but at least, Neville thought, it made more sense than Quidditch. And it sounded way less deadly. Dean Thomas was even worse at most things than Neville was, and sometimes, he even asked him for help. This usually turned out disastrously, but it was also usually quite fun.

The Weasley twins even asked for his help once, if he knew an herb that would prevent explosive diarrhoea. He had been a bit concerned for them at first, and asked why they didn’t simply go to the hospital wing. But apparently, they were working on something that would get you out of class by making you vomit and were just trying to eliminate inconvenient side effects. They had thought he was competent. And it appeared they still did, because they had come to him afterwards and thanked him. They’d even given him a few of the pills they’d created. Those were now carefully stored at the bottom of his trunk in an airtight container – security measures taken after a few unfortunate incidents with the Trevors. Yakking toads weren’t fun. Yakking cousins, however, were. Especially if they didn’t know what was happening to them. Served him right for trying to steal sweets from him.

A spot to the left of his nose was starting to itch. Neville strained, but he still couldn’t move. Damn Hermione, but she was good at what she did. How was he ever going to get out of this situation? This wasn’t good. He could feel his stomach begin to grow heavier. This  _ so _ wasn’t good. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t do  _ anything! _ How was this fair? He couldn’t even scream for help!

But before he completely succumbed to panic, he heard steps trod into the common room. He couldn’t see who it was. He could still move his eyes, but lying facedown on a rug didn’t lend itself to observing people very well. The person was shuffling around a bit, and then it sounded like they sat down on one of the couches in front of the fireplace.

What were they doing here? Couldn’t they sleep? Were they meeting someone? A thought zinged through him. Were they going to go outside like Harry Potter and his friends? At the rate they were currently losing house points, Neville really hoped it wasn’t that. Could you even get in the red with house points? McGonagall would totally deduct even more from them just to teach them a lesson.

Neville was scared of Professor McGonagall. She reminded him of his grandmother. She lacked, of course, the constant urge to complain about petty little things – and Neville was grateful for that – but she was just as severe. She was just as convinced she knew what right and wrong were, and that others should follow the rules. And Neville had tried, he really had. But sometimes, trying wasn’t enough. Like this evening.

There was a soft whooshing sound, and it took Neville a bit to place it.  _ The girl’s dormitory! _ The stairs transformed into a slide when one of the girls wanted to go down them. So there were a girl and a boy in the common room now.

Was this a coincidence? Could they both have some down here at the same time coincidentally?

Whether they could or could not have, it appeared they hadn’t. There was a rustling sound, a whispered “hello”, a giggle, and then weird sucking and smacking noises.  _ Merlin’s pants, they were snogging. _ They were snogging in the middle of the common room in the middle of the night! People actually did that? He’d thought the girls were just giggling about silly rumours, that no one would actually dare.

But it appeared that people did. These two, at least. And it made Neville supremely uncomfortable. All those soft and wet noises… Eugh. That was the moment Neville discovered he couldn’t hum, either. It would have been too much to hope for anyways, seeing as that would have meant he could produce noises to get help. So he resorted to singing in his head.

By the time he realised the only song that was left that he knew the lyrics to was  _ A Steaming Cauldron Full Of Love,  _ which he very much did not want to sing, not even in his head, the two lovebirds seemed to finally decide to go separate ways. They said goodbye amongst a shower of even more kisses, and left Neville lying there, wondering if their lips weren’t hurting.

His nose was numb now. On the one hand, this was good because it meant it wasn’t hurting anymore. On the other hand, it was kind of scary, and this situation was already scary enough. There really wasn’t any need to add to it.

He had already been lying here for way too long. It had to have been hours by this point. His stomach was itching now, which was kind of weird. He was lying on it, how could it be itching? His stomach was also quite a big area to have such a feeling in, which was quite inconvenient. Not nearly as inconvenient as not being able to move to stand up and go to bed, though. He would really like to at least be able to go to sleep. That would be great.

After what felt like yet another few hours, Neville heard the portrait door creak. There were shushing sounds and giggling, and then there was pain and “ouch!” because someone had fallen over him.

“Merlin’s sake, what was that? Did you see anything?” one voice asked.

“No idea.  _ Lumos!” _ another voice responded.

They sounded exactly the same. Neville was already wondering if he’d finally lost his marbles when someone turned him around and he looked into the identical faces of the Weasley twins.  _ Ah. _

“Neville, my man! What happened?” the left one wanted to know.

Neville was forced to stay silent and quickly move his eyes in the hopes they would understand what his problem was.

“George, I don’t think he can talk”, said the right one.

“I think you might be right, George”, said Fred. “Whatever will we do?”

By the time Seamus Finnigan came down from the boys’ dormitory in the morning and got the fright of his life, a ghoul had taken Neville’s place.

It had barely taken the twins a minute to figure out what was wrong with him, but more than half an hour to find out how to reverse it. They had, Neville though, way too much fun with the situation. Where they had found the ghoul, Neville didn’t know, but they had conjured up ridiculous pyjamas for him, petrified him, and put a spell on one of the suits of armour so that it would hold its sword to his throat and laugh manically as soon as someone came near.

Up in the dorm, in his bed, Neville heard the high-pitched scream, smiled, and turned onto his other side.

His smile got even wider when he heard Ron say “Shit,  _ Neville!” _ and stumble out of bed. Harry Potter had not yet returned. Neville wondered what that meant. He hoped it meant he’d gotten into trouble.


End file.
